I remember this from school, must be 30 years ago now...
...'Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, close bosom friend of the maturing sun who conspires with him how to load, and bless with fruit, the vine which round the thatch-eaves run' ... John Keats.
Our dog walks now are excuses to go blackberrying, or brambling, as someone round here called it the other morning. The blackberries are very good this year, large, ripe and plentiful, and it's easy picking if you're not worried about a few stings (nettle) or scratches... I've the stained black fingers/nails to prove it.
I'll have to make jam this weekend. My freezer is already full - ready for the comforting crumbles of winter - but when there's this much abundance it's a shame not to make the most of it.
We've a glut of apples as well.
I'm not entirely sure what the variety is, but I'm guessing it's Cox's Orange Pippin because there's a definite orange flavour - I'd never actually understood it until I ate apples from this tree, but it's there and it works. Wierd, but in a good way.
The wasps love it. The air around the tree is thick with a sweet perfume, and a buzzing reminds you to be careful. There are husks of apples on the ground - barely core and skin, where the wasps have sucked the life out of it and moved onto the next one. The apples actually move under the skin, there are that many wasps there - I counted 6 that I could see in a hole the size of a 10p coin, and there must have been more inside...
So although there's a glut, and I've a fruit bowl full inside and more on the window ledge of the kitchen, there's an awful lot of windfall on the ground being worked over by the wasps. You have to be careful walking past the tree, and if you do want to pick an apple, you should employ extreme caution - I learnt to my cost last year that hastiness equals sting.
There's only one thing worse than a wasp sting, and that's two wasp stings.....
On a lighter note, the children have returned to school, and me to my beloved routine. I made headway on the ironing this morning listening to Radio 4, and I could feel the tension of the holidays dropping from my shoulders.
It's not that I feel I have to entertain the children the whole time, but there's only so much TV/screen time you can allow them, and only so much backchat I can take, so we did have a few excursions on my Wednesdays off when the Library is closed... and my pile of ironing grew and grew....
It's been as nice a summer as I can remember - in fact nicer than I can remember actually. There was the hot summer of 1976, of course, and I seem to think 2003 had some heat to it as well, but there's no reliability to the weather in this country, and of course that's what makes us talk about it so much.
I'll have to download some more photos as I'm sure I had a few of the apple tree, but can't find them just now.
Back in the groove now the children are back at school. Watch this space!
Keep it sweet, Kat :)
...'Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, close bosom friend of the maturing sun who conspires with him how to load, and bless with fruit, the vine which round the thatch-eaves run' ... John Keats.
Our dog walks now are excuses to go blackberrying, or brambling, as someone round here called it the other morning. The blackberries are very good this year, large, ripe and plentiful, and it's easy picking if you're not worried about a few stings (nettle) or scratches... I've the stained black fingers/nails to prove it.
I'll have to make jam this weekend. My freezer is already full - ready for the comforting crumbles of winter - but when there's this much abundance it's a shame not to make the most of it.
We've a glut of apples as well.
I'm not entirely sure what the variety is, but I'm guessing it's Cox's Orange Pippin because there's a definite orange flavour - I'd never actually understood it until I ate apples from this tree, but it's there and it works. Wierd, but in a good way.
The wasps love it. The air around the tree is thick with a sweet perfume, and a buzzing reminds you to be careful. There are husks of apples on the ground - barely core and skin, where the wasps have sucked the life out of it and moved onto the next one. The apples actually move under the skin, there are that many wasps there - I counted 6 that I could see in a hole the size of a 10p coin, and there must have been more inside...
So although there's a glut, and I've a fruit bowl full inside and more on the window ledge of the kitchen, there's an awful lot of windfall on the ground being worked over by the wasps. You have to be careful walking past the tree, and if you do want to pick an apple, you should employ extreme caution - I learnt to my cost last year that hastiness equals sting.
There's only one thing worse than a wasp sting, and that's two wasp stings.....
On a lighter note, the children have returned to school, and me to my beloved routine. I made headway on the ironing this morning listening to Radio 4, and I could feel the tension of the holidays dropping from my shoulders.
It's not that I feel I have to entertain the children the whole time, but there's only so much TV/screen time you can allow them, and only so much backchat I can take, so we did have a few excursions on my Wednesdays off when the Library is closed... and my pile of ironing grew and grew....
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| Peacock butterfly on the buddleia bush overgrowing the derelict building awaiting demolition next to my back/kitchen door... and that's another matter! |
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| Barley field (this year) on the Letcombe footpath |
I'll have to download some more photos as I'm sure I had a few of the apple tree, but can't find them just now.
Back in the groove now the children are back at school. Watch this space!
Keep it sweet, Kat :)
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